Two researchers from the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory have been elected fellows of the American Nuclear Society. Alan S. Icenhour and Jess C. Gehin were recognized for their outstanding scientific and technical leadership in nuclear energy research and development.

Renewed interest in molten salt technology was evident at a recent gathering of advanced nuclear reactor experts at the US Department of Energy’s (DOE’s) Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL). Nearly 200 attendees from national labs, industry, utilities, reactor design firms, and international development companies shared progress in molten salt technology with the hope that their work will move molten salt reactors (MSRs) from concept to construction in the coming years.

How do you handle nuclear waste that will be radioactive for millions of years, keeping it from harming people and the environment? It isn’t easy, but Rutgers researcher Ashutosh Goel has discovered ways to immobilize such waste – the offshoot of decades of nuclear weapons production – in glass and ceramics.

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Sandia National Laboratories sent a mock B61-12 nuclear weapon speeding down the labs’ 10,000-foot rocket sled track to slam nose-first into a steel and concrete wall in a spectacular test that mimicked a high-speed accident. It allowed engineers to examine safety features inside the weapon that prevent inadvertent nuclear detonation.

Since 1952, the Department of Energy’s (DOE) Brookhaven National Laboratory has been home to a national resource whose existence is not widely known outside of its customer base: the National Nuclear Data Center (NNDC), a user facility with a research mission. Alejandro Sonzogni, the new director of the NNDC, sees his mission as adapting the NNDC group’s activities to meet the changing needs of the nuclear community and spreading the word about the services the group offers.

A research group from the University of Saskatchewan has found that the mining and milling of Canadian uranium contributes very few greenhouse gases to nuclear power’s already low emissions. The study, conducted by David Parker, a graduate student in the College of Engineering co-supervised by U of S professor emeritus Gordon Sparks and environmental engineer Cameron McNaughton, was published online in the peer-reviewed journal Environmental Science and Technology.

A group of Texas Tech researchers report this week in Applied Physics Letters that they have developed an alternative material to the rare, expensive gas normally used for neutron detection. This material fulfills many key requirements for helium gas detector replacements and can serve as a low-cost alternative in the future.

The detonation of atomic bombs over the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945 resulted in horrific casualties and devastation. The long-term effects of radiation exposure also increased cancer rates in the survivors. But public perception of the rates of cancer and birth defects among survivors and their children is in fact greatly exaggerated when compared to the reality revealed by comprehensive follow-up studies. The reasons for this mismatch and its implications are discussed in a Perspectives review of the Hiroshima/Nagasaki survivor studies published in the August issue of the journal GENETICS, a publication of the Genetics Society of America.

The U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Argonne National Laboratory will be working with four small businesses on nuclear technology projects under the auspices of DOE’s Gateway for Accelerated Innovation in Nuclear (GAIN).
The projects will be funded through GAIN’s Nuclear Energy Voucher pilot program, which is providing up to $2 million to assist new entrants into the nuclear field as they build the collaborations necessary to accelerate the development and deployment of innovative nuclear technologies.

Researchers are investigating a new material that might help in nuclear fuel recycling and waste reduction by capturing certain gases released during reprocessing more efficiently than today’s technology. The metal-organic framework captures gases at ambient temperature, eliminating an energy-intensive step.

Researchers are investigating a new material that might help in nuclear fuel recycling and waste reduction by capturing certain gases released during reprocessing. Conventional technologies to remove these radioactive gases operate at extremely low, energy-intensive temperatures. By working at ambient temperature, the new material has the potential to save energy, make reprocessing cleaner and less expensive. The reclaimed materials can also be reused commercially.